In the hope of eternal life, which God, who cannot lie,
promised before time eternal.
Titus 1:2.
Dearly Beloved in Christ,
I did not want to let Good Friday go by without us sharing together the good news that we are forgiven, healed, and made righteous by the death of our precious Lord and Savior Jesus on the Cross. God made peace with us through the Blood of the Cross! What does this mean to you? Eternal life.
Jesus bore your sins, iniquities, lawless deeds, sickness, and pains in His own body. He went to the dust of death for you by taking your sentence of condemnation. And He paid your ransom from the slavery to sin and death by His eternal blood. Thus satisfying divine justice and justifying you before God as if you had NEVER sinned. For the Father accounted your sins to Jesus and accounted His righteousness to you. Jesus paid the ransom for all. And you have washed your robes and made them clean in the blood of the Lamb.
In Jesus, you have redemption by His blood, the forgiveness of all your sins. And by His blood the Father transferred you out of the realm of darkness into His own marvelous Light, into the Kingdom of His beloved Son. He reconciled you to Himself by the blood of the cross, not counting your sins against you but putting them all on Jesus, so that you are cleared, clean, pure, and blameless before Him, beyond reproach. It is no longer your fault, but His, He has lifted the burden of sin, guilt, and shame from you. Shame covered His face so that you could gaze upon the Lord God with unveiled face. Look up at the LORD and be radiant and your face will not blush with shame.
What can we say to all this outpouring of divine and everlasting love upon us but thank you? We did nothing to earn it, Jesus did all the work for us but the Father has put us in Christ when we believed. And in Jesus we have ETERNAL LIFE. Yes, God’s Word tells us that you who believe in the name of God’s Son have eternal life. Your names are written in the Lamb’s Book of Life.
What is eternal life? It is the life God has in Himself and all are alive to Him. Eternal life operates simultaneously outside of time, inside of time, and beyond time – it is what gives time its everlasting meaning for the believer through faith, yet it is also time-independent in the sense it forever and has no beginning or ending. Length of days in unending glory. For us, the present age is the only one we know, so our life is time dependent for it is appointed for men to die once and after this comes judgment. Hebrews 9:27. But your life does not stop at physical death, even for your body, for God has not only promised you eternal life for your spirit and soul, but also to raise your body on the last day and clothe it with immortality, united again with your glorified spirit and soul. “But we do not want you to be uninformed, brethren, about those who are asleep, so that you will not grieve as do the rest who have no hope. For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so God will bring with Him those who have fallen asleep in Jesus. For this we say to you by the word of the Lord, that we who are alive and remain until the coming of the Lord, will not precede those who have fallen asleep. For the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive and remain will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we shall always be with the Lord. Therefore comfort one another with these words.” 1 Thessalonians 4:13-18.
For those of you who are believers in Jesus, if you die your earthly death before Jesus returns to also redeem your bodies at His second coming, your spirit and soul have been redeemed and you will be absent from your body but present with God in the Kingdom. And do not worry, you will not miss your body and you will be easily recognizable by all, just looking much better, younger and perfect in every way for your spirit and your soul exactly fit your body, but it is the spirit that gives life. But you still have the redemption of your body to look forward to. For you must understand that for you who believe in the Name of Jesus, you have eternal life. For whoever believes that Jesus is the Messiah is begotten of God and whoever is born of God overcomes the world; and this is the victory that has overcome the world—your faith. And faith comes from hearing the testimony of God concerning His Son. The one who believes in Jesus has the testimony in himself; the one who does not believe God has made Him a liar, because he has not believed in the testimony that He has given concerning Jesus, His Son. And what is that testimony? The Holy Spirit in you testifies this to you, and it is this, that God has given you eternal life, and this life is in Jesus, His Son. He who has Jesus has the life; he who does not have Jesus, does not have the life. It is that simple. He is the Way, the Truth, and THE LIFE.
But there is MUCH MORE for us here. Remember that eternal life operates simultaneously outside of time, inside of time, and beyond time, it is also time-independent. So when you believe in Jesus, and He is abiding in you and His Words are abiding in you, you are already abiding in eternal life. When Jesus died to sin once for all, so did you in Him, for He bore your sins, and when God raised Him up and exalted Him, and seated Him at His right hand, He raised you who are in Him, up with Him, for your sins are gone, and seated you there in Him and with Him. Ephesians 2:6. Jesus told you that He would prepare a place for you and come back and take you with Him so that where He is you also may be. That is not just when you die physically. He became the new and living way to the Holy of Holies, behind the veil, for you when He died upon the Cross and ascended back to God, the Father. He came forth from deep within the Father, the generated Word, and He has returned to that deep place in Him, the bosom of God’s heart. And He has ushered you in with Him. In the Spirit you are already abiding in eternity while you still walk in time and live a life that is basically governed by your physical senses and body in where you are at the present time for your daily activities and works, but even though we are in the world we are not of the world, for we fix our gaze on things that are not seen by abiding in God’s Words. You are abiding in and attached to the heavenly Vine but you are still upon the earth producing the fruit of the Vine. But you can hear from and know things from Heaven by the Holy Spirit.
God has poured His Spirit into your heart and it is in the gift of the Holy Spirit, which Jesus calls “the Promise of the Father,” that God gives us His life, that gives us eternal life to raise us up entirely complete, spirit, soul, and body on the last day. “Now may the God of peace Himself sanctify you entirely; and may your spirit and soul and body be preserved complete, without blame at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. Faithful is He who calls you, and He also will bring it to pass.” 1 Thessalonians 5:23-24.
The apostle Paul was taken up to the third Heaven where God dwells in everlasting light and whether he was in his body or out of it he did not know. So you see that for spiritual dwelling, your spirit and soul are not dependent on your earthly body as you are to be functioning on the earth. It is the spirit that gives life. But I want you to see, Paul was still himself, whether in or out of the earthly tent that is the body. The same with John when God took him up to the throne room of Heaven though he was physically in the cave on Patmos. And though John is with God now in the Kingdom of Heaven, his body has not been raised to glory yet. But that is coming, as it is for all of us who believe in Jesus as Lord. “In Him, you also, after listening to the message of truth, the gospel of your salvation—having also believed, you were sealed in Him with the Holy Spirit of promise, who is given as a pledge of our inheritance, with a view to the redemption of possession, to the praise of His glory.” Ephesians 1:13-14.
You were sealed in Christ by the Holy Spirit as soon as you believed. “This is the will of Him who sent Me, that of all that He has given Me I lose nothing but raise it up on the last day. For this is the will of My Father, that everyone who beholds the Son and believes in Him will have eternal life, and I Myself will raise him up on the last day.” John 6:39-40.
You may wonder how the dead will be raised, for some have been cremated and their ashes scattered, others were devoured by wild beasts, some were lost at sea, and there are many other ways people have died. But for God it is simple, we read in His Word that He will sound the trumpet and the dead will be raised! Yes, as you watch, from the four winds you will see the strands of resurrected DNA coming and wrapping around the spirits and souls of those already with the Lord in Heaven coming with Jesus in the clouds and you who are still living in your bodies on earth at that instant of His second coming will be caught up with them and in the twinkling of an eye you will see yourself and everyone changed, though it is still YOU! “Then they will see the Son of Man coming in clouds with great power and glory. And then He will send forth the angels and will gather together His elect from the four winds, from the farthest end of the earth to the farthest end of heaven.” Mark 13:26-27. And again, “they will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of the sky with power and great glory. And He will send forth His angels with a great trumpet and they will gather together His elect from the four winds, from one end of the sky to the other.” Mathew 24:30-31.
And Paul, by the Spirit, wrote about this too, “Now I say this, brethren, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God; nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable. Behold, I tell you a mystery; we will not all sleep, but we will all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet; for the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed. For this perishable must put on the imperishable, and this mortal must put on immortality. But when this perishable will have put on the imperishable, and this mortal will have put on immortality, then will come about the saying that is written, “Death is swallowed up in victory. O death, where is your victory? O death, where is your sting?” The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law; but thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore, my beloved brethren, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that your toil is not in vain in the Lord.” 1 Corinthians 15:50-58.
“May the Lord cause you to increase and abound in love for one another, and for all people, just as we also do for you; so that He may establish your hearts without blame in holiness before our God and Father at the coming of our Lord Jesus with all His saints (believers who have died before His second coming).” 1 Thessalonians 3:12-13.
Jesus told you that eternal life is to know the Father, the one true God, and the One He sent Jesus Christ. Do you see? Intimate fellowship and knowing just as we are known, walking in perfect understanding and agreement as we partner with Him in the work of the Kingdom on earth until we have finished the work He gave us to do here and pass on to take up our heavenly assignments in the vast and great Kingdom of God.
And just stopping at the knowledge of the Father, the one true God, is not enough, you must have the revelation of His Son. Without Him, you will perish for you are not reconciled to God apart from Him. Only Jesus bore your sins, iniquities, diseases, pains, condemnation, and sentence to eternal death for you so that you could be blameless, holy, sanctified, and made righteous in the sight of God without reproach.
“As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up; so that whoever believes will in Him have eternal life. For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life. For God did not send the Son into the world to judge the world, but that the world might be saved through Him. He who believes in Him is not judged; he who does not believe has been judged already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.” John 3:14-18.
You perish without Him, you live forever in the Kingdom, starting now, with Him. What do you choose? God’s Will is that none should perish but that all would repent and have eternal life. 2 Peter 3:9.
So for victory in this life and the next only one thing is required without which you are lost, and that is JESUS. And His Name means Salvation. The Father has found a ransom; you will not go down to the pit. Job 33:23-25. He will save His people from their sins, and He is the only way to be saved, the only Name given among men by which you must be saved. But what a glorious, perfect, precious living Way the Father has given you to Himself. He is the only way to live and the only way to die. He is the resurrection and the life, and He came to bring you abundant life. And to have it He gave you His peace and shared His joy with you. “For you will go out with joy and be led forth with peace.” Isaiah 55:12.
He is the good Shepherd who leads you out to lead you in. “My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me; and I give eternal life to them, and they will never perish; and no one will snatch them out of My hand. My Father, who has given them to Me, is greater than all; and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father’s hand. I and the Father are one.” John 10:27-30.
Jesus reveals the Father to us and the Father reveals Jesus to us, and the Holy Spirit testifies to Jesus. And God has made a promise to you before time eternal, and that promise is “yes” to you in Jesus, and the promise which He Himself made to you is this: ETERNAL LIFE. 1 John 2:25; Titus 1:2. And that life is in Jesus. 1 John 5:11. He is true God and true Man. 1 John 5:20.
And Jesus is God’s Word made flesh. And God’s Words are words of eternal life, they are Spirit and Life. His Words are life to those who find them, and health to all their flesh. Proverbs 4:22. He sent His Word to heal you and deliver you from your destructions. Psalm 107:20. Receive the implanted Word it has the power to save your souls. James 1:21. The Word is the Way, the Truth, and the Life.
Eye has not seen and ear has not heard the magnificence of what God has prepared for those who love Him. Eternal life is a life of oneness with Him where there will no longer be any death; there will no longer be any mourning, or crying, or pain; the first things will have passed away. Behold, He makes all things new! Revelation 21:4-5. And there will no longer be any night; and you will not have need of the light of a lamp nor the light of the sun, because the Father and the Son will illumine you and you will reign forever and ever. Revelation 22:5. Death is nothing to fear for the believer, it is just the door to another, and far more glorious, level of existence with our God. And we do not walk through that door alone, we continue in our fellowship and partnership with the One who loved us and gave His life for us that we might live through and with Him forever.
God’s love for you is manifest in Jesus. Take hold of the eternal life He promised you before the world began and begin living it now. It is yours in Jesus and it is in you by the Holy Spirit. Remember Ezekiel and the vision of the dry bones? God will bring you out of your grave.
Let us all pray together as we open our hearts to Jesus in accordance with Romans 10:8-10:
“Heavenly Father, thank you for Jesus. He died for me. I believe you raised Him from the dead. I confess that Jesus is Lord, Jesus is my Lord. Please fill me with your Holy Spirit and lead me in that beautiful life you prepared for me in advance that I might enjoy it. Amen.”
Please join our weekly Bible study on Zoom from 2:00 pm to 3:00 pm Hawaii time. We have it every Sunday so if you can join us this Sunday, which is Easter, please do as we will have it. Right now we are doing a series of Life Lessons from the Lord on how to live the abiding life of John 15:7.
Here is the link:
Meeting ID: 828 6790 0488
Passcode: 308349
I wish you a glorious Easter, Resurrection Sunday! Remember Jesus is the resurrection and the life and that resurrection power is working in you now to heal, strengthen, and quicken your mortal bodies. Be healed, be whole, be blessed, and in Jesus you already are, just receive it.
Love and shalom forever,
Bonnie
